Estudo da viabilidade de uso do aço ferramenta AISI D6 para corte de placas de baterias chumbo-ácido.

Abstract

The tool steels have an important participation in the world market with regard to engineering. They are used in the metal-mechanic industry as cutting tools, molds, punches, among other applications. Because of its great importance, it is essential to discuss the relationship between the microstructure and the mechanical properties, since it is a common practice in industry to specify thermal treatments based mainly on the final hardness of the material, without considering that for a same hardness value a steel tool may have different mechanical properties, depending on the heat treatment cycle applied. Therefore, the selection of heat treatment is a relevant technological aspect in the performance of these steels. Considering the wide possibility of mechanical properties obtained (fracture toughness) with different thermal treatments, this work had the objective of specifying a national tool steel and a set of thermal treatment parameters that allow the use of this material as a substitute for a another imported steel used in the manufacture of cutting blades used in the processing of lead plates. The steel selected for the development of this work was AISI D6 steel, the selection of this steel was made taking as a base the characteristics obtained through field analysis and microhardness and microstructure of the cutting blades already in the process made with steel imported. With the selected steel in hand, two different tempering and tempering treatments were applied (one proposed by the manufacturer and another proposed by the work in progress), where the effect of the thermal treatments on the mechanical and microstructural properties of the material was evaluated. By analyzing the results of the relationship between hardness and toughness, it was found that for the two thermal treatments applied, there were no significant variations of the mechanical properties of the material, and that both treatments presented satisfactory results. The specified national steel tool was presented as an alternative to replace the currently used imported steel. Field tests with the blade manufactured with the national steel specified in this study and that received the thermal treatment proposed by the manufacturer (FAB), corroborated with the analysis of the properties, as it was observed an increase in the cutting life time in more than 30 %.